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Friday Facts: Narnia, Math, Linguistics, Lascivious Radios

:: Median age of mathematics texts used in city public schools: 18 years
:: Median tenure of mathematics teachers in city schools: 4.5 years
:: Median SAT mathematics score, city schools (2008): 485
:: Percentage of 12th graders in city schools who know how ‘median’ differs from ‘average’: 38%

:: A city ordinance passed in 1931 prohibited the hiring by city hospitals of any registered nurse “younger than nine years of age, regardless of experience or education.” State medical laws, which supersede municipal doctrine, mandate a minimum age of 21.

:: The city’s official “Fictional Sister City” is Narnia, according to a 2001 mayoral edict. Prior to that, it had been Atlantis.

:: Languages which have been banned within city limits over the years include, but are not limited to: French, Portuguese, Java, Tagalog, Mandarin, “variants of Basque,” English and “Anything even remotely Irish.”

:: A Baltimore and Ohio Railroad “fight special” bearing more than a hundred boxing fans to the city for a series of welterweight title matches was met by special police at Central Depot on this day in 1927, to respond to complaints of illegal drink-mixing and gun sales on the Common Rate car.

:: A short-lived fad of the parachute pants era led to the 1985 creation of a city ordinance banning the public use, display or sale of stereo equipment “cast into fiberglass mold or other realistic reproduction, or in any way deliberately intended to resemble, the bosoms, hind-quarters or generative organs of either male or female human beings.” The ordinance was finally repealed earlier this week.

:: A gentlemen’s club operating near the prestigious Hartmann Arms Hotel has lost a two-month battle to dub itself “The Hartmann Tits and Ass.”

:: According to local tradition, chili served without beans is colloquially referred to as “Slur.”– David Andrews, Jonathan Morris